


Trouble on my Tongue

by Heronfem



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Friendship/Love, Introspection, M/M, Self Confidence, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 12:23:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14894576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heronfem/pseuds/Heronfem
Summary: "No thank you" is what I should've said, I should be in bedBut temptations of trouble on my tongue, troubles yet to comeHanamaki's had a day. Matsukawa loves him anyway.





	Trouble on my Tongue

**Author's Note:**

> "Vinn you've been writing a lot of Matsuhana lately."  
> I'm highly motivated, this block of cheese with a knife keeps staring at me until I get it right. 
> 
> Prompted from "Weak" by AJR.

Rain patters on the windows of their apartment as Hanamaki Takahiro curls up in the very corner of the couch and thinks very gloomy thoughts. Issei knows that they must be gloomy thoughts on account of the fact that Hanamaki has The Dramatic Hoodie on, and pajama pants with extremely cute Sanrio characters on them. He'd walked through the door to their apartment after a mind numbing and exhausting day of work at the office to his writer boyfriend considering the rain, and now as he hangs up his coat he finds himself glad that he left work on time instead of staying late to double check the project he's been working on. 

If there's a problem, it's one that can wait until the weekend's done. 

The Dramatic Hoodie is one of Issei's, an enormous black thing with the masks of the theater grimacing in white on the front that drowns him and absolutely swamps Hanamaki. He likes to wear it when he's feeling sad and wants to be cuddled but Issei isn't home. Issei pulls his shoes off and flicks his tie away onto the table, loosening the top three buttons of his shirt as he walks across the floor to the couch. Hanamaki's recently made the switch to working part time at one job and writing part time on his books, and he looks tired. Issei's not fond of it when Hanamaki gets tired and sad. Sadness isn't something he likes to see on Hanamaki's face in any context. 

“Yen for your thoughts?” Issei asks, sitting down next to him. 

“I'm a fraud,” Hanamaki says baldly, chin propped in his hand as he watches out the window at the grey skies. “A fraud in sheep's clothing.”

“Mmm, no, a fraud in plants clothing. That hoodie is cotton, not wool.”

That gets him a smile, and Hanamaki shifts so he can rest his head on Issei's shoulder. Issei takes his hand, rubbing his knuckles with his thumb, and they sit in comfortable silence for a little bit before Hanamaki says, “It's difficult, you know.”

“Hmm?”

“Juggling it all in my head. All the little things, the... the motivations, the story, the dialogue, it's a lot of things in the air and I can't drop any of them. What kind of authority do I have to write about any of this shit?” Hanamaki frowns, using his free hand to pluck at a loose string on his hoodie.

“I mean, that Master's degree says you spent a lot of time and money to be allowed to,” Issei says mildly, nodding at the framed paper on the wall. “Unless some other Hanamaki Takahiro broke into our house to hang up degrees in History and Literature, I mean. It could have happened. You never know.”

Hanamaki snorts, smile flashing back onto his face. He turns into Issei's neck, and Issei settles so he'll be more comfortable. “You know what I mean.”

“Mmm, nope. Not a clue.” Issei smiles, looking at the window as the rain patters down. 

“Someone could do it better,” Hanamaki says after a moment of quiet, and his voice has gone quiet and serious. Issei's smile falls. “Someone could do it way better than I am. I don't know what I'm thinking, trying to tell this story when there are a ton of other people who've told the same thing and told it better. I don't have any claim to shit like this, it's just a story. Just some words on a page. And lots of people could do it a million times better. What am I _doing_ , trying this?”

Issei watches the rain. “Y'know... other people could do the same thing. People retell stories all the time, fairy tale stories. They're different every time. Different words, little differences like, I dunno, what color a shirt is or if they have glasses. No one's going to do it like you. And you're not going to do it like someone else would. You could be the best forger in the world and you couldn't do a perfect replica of, I dunno, a Monet. Because you'd put a piece of you into it, not a piece of Monet. Everybody puts a bit of themselves in their work, y'know. Your fingerprints are all over what you write, and I don't just mean because you got cream on the print out, _again_.”

Hanamaki sighs. “Yeah. I know. I gotta start locking them in like a safe or something so I don't eat them so fast.”

“I'll find a cream puff safe for you, babe.” 

“You're a man after my own heart.”

“Damn gay.”

“I appreciate you not saying damn straight,” Hanamaki says with the solemnity of a priest.

“It would be a dumb thing to lie about.” Issei turns so he can press a kiss to the top of Hanamaki's head. “And it doesn't mean this shit's not going to be hard. Nothing's easy all the time. Everybody gets stuck, so cut yourself a little bit of slack for not suddenly having written the next cultural marvel. We all hit walls.”

Hanamaki grimaces, squeezing his hand. “What if this is a wall I can't get over?”

Issei shrugs. “Plenty of ways to get past a wall. You don't have to climb over it. Get a shovel and start digging. Rent a wrecking ball and make like that American girl with the tongue. Plant vines, wait for the vines to grow, climb the vines over the wall. Make a ladder out of scrap wood and lingerie. Appeal to Mr. Gorbachev.”

“Didn't Gorbachev die?”

“That sounds like a you problem.”

Hanamaki laughs, shoulders shaking, and Issei's heart eases. 

“Potential need to learn necromancy aside,” Issei says, reaching up to run his fingers through Hanamaki's hair, “you know what I mean. There's no right way to do things, and no wrong way either. And there's no way to sit down and know exactly what's going to happen at what time every moment of every day. We all have shit that bogs us down, or walls that come up and surround us. We all get bad days, or months, or years.”

“Pretty shitty being stuck in one, though.”

“Yeah, it is.” Issei kisses the top of his head again. “But you'll figure it out. Maybe not tonight or tomorrow, maybe not this week or even this month, but things will change. You'll see.”

Hanamaki sighs. “It feels like I'm drowning in waiting for things to shift. I don't want to wait, I want it _now_.”

“Sucks, doesn't it?”

“It does.”

“That's okay.” Issei pulls him in closer so Hanamaki's been practically pulled up onto his lap. “Nothing's getting fixed tonight, but we'll find a way to look at it with a new perspective later. We'll break the walls. Just got to find the right tools.”

“Spell books, probably.”

“Not sure if we can get those downtown.”

“You can get anything downtown,” Hanamaki rebukes him, and tips his head up to kiss him slow and sweet. Issei's heart swoops in his chest, his hand coming up to cup his boyfriend's cheek to hold him there. It's a quiet, peaceful little moment. He feels more whole when Hanamaki pulls back with a smile, and kisses his forehead. Hanamaki closes his eyes, his smile helpless, and Issei feels any leftover tension of the day drain away. 

The rain patters at the windows, and Issei pulls the blanket off of the back of the couch to wrap them both in it. Dinner can wait. They listen to the Tokyo rain in companionable silence, watching the city outside their balcony become awash with rain and the neon reflecting off of buildings and pools of water. 

All is not well, not yet, but in time it will be better. 

Issei is content.

**Author's Note:**

> The Gorbachev joke is courtesy of my not-father, who spent a good chunk of his formative years in Berlin while the wall was up. Never change, Scott.
> 
> Comments feed this ravenous and struggling beast! You can find me at either Maneazu or Heronfem on tumblr.


End file.
